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“Give me cover!” I roared before I burst into my unkindness.
We took flight, plunging downward into the chaos of the bailey before pulling up, gliding over the clash of swords toward Brisden. Close. We were so fucking close. All we needed was—
Something moved the air.
Ropes tangled around our wings, our beaks, our feet, catching us in its merciless grip. A collective screech echoed from us as the weight of the net pulled us to the ground. Claws ripped. Beaks pecked. Wings brushed against each other.
Trapped. We were trapped!
Wings turned into shoving hands.
Claws turned into kicking legs.
I tugged, yanked, and twisted, detangling myself from the net. I wriggled out, casting it off to the side just as a deadly shadow fell over me.
A sword whistled through the air.
I rolled to the side, narrowly avoiding the strike. Gritting my teeth against the persistent agony in my hand, I thrust my palm out, a surge of shadows exploding from it. They collided with the attacker, sending him sprawling backward to the blood-soaked ground.
Another soldier ran toward me, his sword held high for a strike. It never cut through the air, his efforts and life snipped short when a shadowy arrow punctured his neck, and another protruded from his chest.
This place was a grave.
One I needed to escape.
My eyes found Brisden again. I scrambled to my feet, dashing toward him alternating feet, wings, and swings of my sword, my quick shifts fueled by years of hatred. I was so close. So fucking close!
Until a merciless stab punctured my heart.
The brutal onslaught struck without warning, forcing myaerymelblade from my grip. What was this pain? A sword through my middle?
Staggering, my hand shot to my chest as I looked down at myself, sinking to my knees. No, there was no sword. There was… nothing. Nothing but profound agony. Bottomless grief. An acute sense of loss.
“Malyr? You have to get up!” Sebian appeared from shadows writhing beside me, his knees sinking into the mud. “What the fuck is going on with you? Get up!”
Dread. Fear. Panic.
It slammed into the very fabric of my being, wrapping around my heart and lungs, pulling tight until all air rushed out of me. I glanced back in the direction of the portcullis, toward Brisden, but whatever rage I’d harbored only moments ago had been swept away by this…something. Something I’d never felt before, but… it seemed like the beginning and end of my very being.
“Galantia,” I choked out, the name searing through me, carving its path into my very core where my bond hummed a chaotic tune.
Sebian’s gaze followed my line of sight. “What are you talking about? Galantia,what?”
The pain within me did not dissipate, nor did it escalate—it fluctuated, like a rhythmic torment playing its haunting melody in sync with my pulsing heartbeat. It wasn’t just pain; it was a warning.
It was the bond.
“Something went wrong,” I said. “I think she released her gift.”
“We have to find her!” Sebian shot to his feet before he grabbed my arm and yanked me onto mine. “You have to find her, Malyr! Where is she? Where!?”
My gaze tore through the chaos, trying to find her creamy hair in this ocean of darkness and despair. “I… I don’t know.”
Sebian glanced back over his shoulder toward where she wassupposedto be. “The dungeons?”
“No,” I said with a certainty that baffled me. It wasn’t something I knew, but rather… sensed. An instinct. “She never made it there.”
“The bond, Malyr,” Sebian said. “Listen to the bond in your chest. Where is it pulling you?”
